When I was just a wee bit more than a child, my parent's instructed me that a pen was an essential, you must carry a pen and I have ever since. I never use some germy pen at the doctors office, what the hell are they thinking, it could have mersa, c diff, cooties or worse. There now everyone will carry their own pen.

Typical, of course. What used to annoy me, but these days amuses me, are the places that have strings attached to their pens, where the length of the string is fine for right handed people, but awful for those of us Eternally Cursed by Cthulhu to be left handed. My penmanship isn't what it used to be, so I don't fret about it.

Did you check her purse for the free toilet paper that patients think they're entitled to?You wonder why there's no toilet paper in the little cupboard under the sink -- it's cause people like you steal it!!

Don, I was thinking the same thing. Unless someone who is left handed strings the pen on the clipboard it's not long enough. When I was still teaching I would erase the chalkboard as I wrote on it! I truly feel your pain! Ironically, all the left handed students were placed in my room, EVERY YEAR!

I carry my own pen, and prefer to use it (who knows who used it before you)! Mrs. Ink would have probably complained HAD it not been tied because she would drop it or forget to return it and then it would be Mary's fault that she took the pen. She was looking to be a PITA and nothing would have made her happy!

Amazing! I know a kindergarten teacher who had a student who never brought a snack for the official snack time. Of course, the teacher felt bad so she always gave the child something from her self-purchased snack stash. When the teacher questioned the child about why she never had a snack the child said, "My momma said you can give me a snack since you make a nice salary."

We have plastic spoons with faces drawn on them duct-taped to our counter pens.

And what everyone else said: If you don't want to use the pen that's tied down, use your own. I always hated the pens that were tied down because I'm left-handed and they were inevitably tied with a very short string to the right side of the clipboard.

I had a teacher who would take your shoe as collateral when you borrowed a pen or pencil from her.It never ceased to amaze me how many students, of all ages, wouldn't have a single pen, pencil, or piece of paper on the FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL.

Welcome to my whining!

This blog is entirely for entertainment purposes. All posts about patients may be fictional, or be my experience, or were submitted by a reader, or any combination of the above. Factual statements may or may not be accurate.

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